Gothic Cathedrals
It was November, the Monday before Thanksgiving, and the always-noisy, mechanical hustle-and-bustle of the nature-less city seemed to slow, as if holding its breath in baited anticipation. The skyscrapers going all googly-windowed, as if jabbering with...
The Darkest Night of the Year
Today was an 'almost-winter' Saturday. They wore their heavy coats. They left the 'Snow Bear' ice creamery, and wandered, slowly, time to spare, past the bread shop, where everything smelled of honey-wheat and baguettes, and blueberry bug...
Beautifully Tethered
A breath taken. Lungs filling, and a heart beating. And mind unfurling (like those morning flowers do). 'I see and smell and hear that You are, indeed, ushering in another day, my Lord,' was the just-waking, mental prayer. Thought up at...
Kenapocomoco
On the banks of the Eel River, the 'Kenapocomoco,' the 'Snake Fish,' on a farm near some narrow, leaf-floored woods, a farm near wider, more open fields (of would-be corn and soybeans and alfalfa), Rhine and her husband lived. A few miles from her...
Bon Hiver
It fell in flitter-fluttering flakes, like a million parachutes. It fell in a slate-grey, later-day light, the open horizon all hazy (where did it start, and where did it end), and all the naked trees, with their sky-reaching limbs, trying to...
Hoosier Tomatoes
They were sitting side-by-side on the kitchen counter, foot-paws bare, toes wriggling, not quite reaching the off-yellow linoleum of the floor. Cast in the soft, golden glow of a singular, sixty-watt bulb, which was hung in a fixture above the silvery,...
Scurry-ful
Nighttime. And an 8:04 yawn, and a 28-degree whisker-twitch, with warmth wafting from the closed oven, and gourds (yellow, green, and orange) in the middle of the kitchen table (in lieu of once-displayed flowers). And a ladybug crawling, barely...
A Folded Bird
The night, now prematurely born (in a fit of time-changing, legislated scorn), struggled to breathe. Not yet weaned from the drug called 'warmth,' and that drug called 'day.' The drugs that simply couldn't stay. Leaving all in a state of...
Sheltered from the Coming Cold
In the fall, shuttered, sheltered from the coming cold, the old, white farm-house buried in the marigolds, Field listened. Swivel, went his ears. Swivel! Quietly, blankly, he listened to that rain. The rain that relentlessly, ferociously...
No Sloe Gin Tonight
The dryer was tumbling end over end. All the clothes inside, in a great whirl of fabric and color. Unseen to the eye. But heard. And the skyscrapers, outside the windows, stood tall and still. Very still, with their lighted attire. Their signs,...
Waechtersbach
The snowflake-shaped lights, strung from the curtain rods, glowed in their pale, plastic way. And, outside, the land was in a film of snow. It had only fallen last night ... "Waechtersbach," said Field. And he bounced her a tiny bit (the tiniest...
Victory for the Romantic Muse
"I believe we have met before ... " Aria extended a paw. The meadow mouse looked up, a bit shyly. "Oh. Yes," he said. "Aria?" He took her paw. Fingers with his. "Yes," was her kind whisper. Her dress loose, a shimmering blue (like the...